Dr. Sue Leschine

The Leschine Laboratory has long been interested in cellulose decomposition. In 1996, she and her lab assistant, Tom Warnick, isolated a unique bacterium later named Clostridium phytofermentans. This organisms affectionately refereed to as the Q Microbe has been sequenced by the Joint Genome Institute and is being explored as an assay to measure plant feedstock properties. Dr. Leschine is also the founder and chief scientist of the biofuels company Qteros.